Introduction
This body of research has been developed over four years. With a background in Chinese art and history, traditional and historical perspectives have always been a foundation of my education. For over a decade, I have been traversing countries, languages, media, literature, and art, searching for precisely the necessary means to represent the significance and complexity of the tradition and culture, as well as why they matter today. However, after spending so long away from home, there has often been a struggle with the tremendous difference between East and West and with identifying or bridging the crucial aspects that constitute this difference. Therefore, with my solid studies in Chinese painting and my knowledge — as well as enthusiasm — for traditional poetry, and as an artist who has also studied electronic media and is working primarily with sound and visual experimental and performative works, I start this journey of investigating, reclaiming, and creating.
Chinese poetry, writing, and painting (like all cultural forms of expression), in the context of Chinese aesthetics, contain both meaning and form. My current focus involves vocal and visual performance, in an attempt to disclose/reveal (with sonic–visual means) the formative rhythmic patterns that constitute deeply rooted traditions of Chinese cultural expression. Writing, painting, and singing in Chinese are embodied forms, incorporating intricate vocal nuances and subtly ‘drawn’ gestures — gestures of writing and gestures of speech. Indeed, in Chinese, even writing is performative. And rather than consider the particular textual content of the poems or lyrics, in these works I focus instead on revealing the sound patterns, lyrical intonation, rhythmic precision, and methods of representing or drawing rhythm.1 How the historical and theoretical considerations of continuity extend into a contemporary form in this research project are detailed in the sections below.
